


The Silence of Noise

by Sirenidae



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Anxiety, Comfort, Crack, Cute, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Crack, Gen, Mild Language, One Shot, PTSD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Prompt Fic, Short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-04
Updated: 2013-09-04
Packaged: 2017-12-25 15:26:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/954725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sirenidae/pseuds/Sirenidae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mako is seeking a refuge away from the overwhelming atmosphere of the shatterdome, away from the stress and the people and the hero-worship. What she finds is something very unexpected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Silence of Noise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shaymin420](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=shaymin420).



> Takes place immediately after the events of the movie in the Hong Kong shatterdome.
> 
> For tumblr user [shaymin420](http://shaymin420.tumblr.com) from my [Pacific Rim Fic Prompt and Rec post ](http://thebitchqueenofangmar.tumblr.com/post/58202833041/pacific-rim-fic-prompts-or-requests)on tumblr.
> 
> View original post [here](http://thebitchqueenofangmar.tumblr.com/post/60286011362/the-noise-of-silence-for-shaymin420).

They kept telling her she needed to be “debriefed”, kept shoving that word in her face along with medical instruments to measure her temperature, blood pressure, heart rate, and neural activity. They were doing it to Raleigh too. “We need to see if the Anteverse had any effect on you, Raleigh,” they said. “And if the throat had any effect on you, Mako,” they told her.

So they stuck sensors on her and wrote down the results. “Oh,” they would say. “You have higher blood pressure than would be expected.” She would look over at Raleigh who understood why her blood pressure was so high; this was stressful, and the memories the procedures were dragging up: painful. She clenched her jaw and willed herself to make it through.

Mako and Raleigh were cared for in one same room of the medical bay, their gurney-style beds never more than a few feet apart: farther and Mako and Raleigh would become agitated. They spoke to each other in Japanese, talking over the English and the Mandarin of the doctors in the Hong Kong shatterdome, keeping up a steady stream of conversation to soothe each other. At night they would fall asleep holding hands over the little gap between their beds.

It had been two weeks of this before the new Marshall, Hercules Hansen, gave the order to release them from medical observation. “Take it slow, take it easy,” he advised them both on the day of their discharge. “The world just gained two of the biggest heroes it has ever seen and we don’t want to lose you now.” Herc then grabbed both Mako and Raleigh into a gruff hug. “Thank you,” he said, voice breaking. “I won’t ever be able to thank you enough.”

As soon as the pair began to tackle the stress of living outside of the medical bay, the media descended. Raleigh and Mako were bombarded with phone calls, emails, and letters at all possible hours of the day. They could hear news helicopters constantly chopping the air outside the shatterdome and sometimes, if they were very quiet when they walked close to the main doors, they could hear the dull buzz of thousands of people camped outside the walls. Everyone was waiting to catch a glimpse of the heroes. It didn’t happen often, but even the shatterdome workers would try to budge into their space, wanting just to chat with Raleigh or Mako, touching them, breathing on them, smiling at them.

Raleigh hated the attention and he didn’t try to mask the fact that he was handling it poorly. He ripped the phone out of his wall and didn’t turn on his computer once. He let the unopened mail accumulate and used the piles around his room as extra surfaces on which he placed various things: coffee mugs, a lamp, paperback books. Soon his entire room was covered in a film of white and manila envelopes that he successfully ignored. His room was his sanctuary and he hardly ever left it, save only to eat and shower.

Mako couldn’t stand the bombardment either and it got under her skin more than it did Raleigh. She wanted to be left in peace, to quietly and respectfully mourn the loss of adoptive father, of her sensei. Even near the calming presence of Raleigh, the noise and the questions and the letters became very overwhelming very quickly. Once she and Raleigh were comfortable being physically apart from each other for extended periods of time, Mako began to actively seek out little secluded places where she could hide from the cacophony of attention for certain stretches of time during the day.

“I know where you go, Mako,” Raleigh said to her about a month after the explosion in the Breach. She was in his room, lying on his floor, flipping through his newest stack of photographs. “Hiding all about the shatterdome.” Mako shrugged.

“You know I don’t want to talk to anyone right now.”

Raleigh swiveled in his chair to face her. “I know. I feel it too. When they speak to me it’s as if…” he trailed off, gesturing helplessly as he tried to explain the feeling but there was no need. Both he and Mako had barely said two words to anyone other than Herc or Tendo that weren’t accompanied by intense feelings of anxiety. “Will you take me with you one of these days?” he asked.

Mako turned over onto her side and looked at him. “One of these days,” she agreed before returning to the photographs. “These are really good, Raleigh,” Mako added, changing the subject.

Mako had shared so much with Raleigh, she felt she might lose herself completely if she didn’t have one secret left to keep. This was one aspect of her life that she had all to herself: this hiding and avoiding. If Raleigh knew where she was going, knew what she was up to, she had to change her tactics. So Mako began to seek out better hiding places, climbing the tallest scaffolding on the old Jaeger hanger bays, up on the metal beams and walkways that no one visited any more. Even with everyone milling about on the floor below, this hiding spot was still too noisy for Mako, no matter how high up she was.

That’s when she journeyed down into the bowels of the shatterdome, down into the sub-levels where the air was different: cooler and quieter, calmer and clearer. Mako found that the lower atmosphere helped her think, comforting her mind and slowing the turbulence of her troubled thoughts. It was on the third day of her exploring the new floors that she stumbled upon the lab.

Mako had been to all levels of the Hong Kong shatterdome, visited the rooms, seen the blueprints, but she was only really familiar with the Jaeger bays, the mess hall, the Kwoon, and the bunks. So when she found herself standing in front of a strange door that was slightly ajar, she hesitated only a moment before walking in, shutting the door behind her.

She blinked a few times, letting her eyes adjust. The room was dimly lit; a single lamp deep within the darkened room the only source of light. It shone on a table containing several medium sized aquarium tanks filled with varying combinations of dirt, water, and grass samples, next to several jars of pebbles and Kaiju entrails. Mako took another step into the room, curious, before a noise halted her progress.

“In light of the recent closing of the Breach,” a voice said from the shadows. “What is left is the study and categorization of the environmental effects of Kaiju remains upon our earth, water, and atmosphere.” A figure wearing a headlamp, surgical gloves, jeans, and a plain gray tee shirt walked into view of the spotlight. It was Dr. Newton Geiszler and he was speaking into a recording device that was balanced on the top of one aquarium. “What follows are the results from preliminary experiments with soil and Kaiju Blue, specifically the resulting erosion patterns in coastal areas.”

Mako froze, not wanting him to notice her. This wasn’t his usual laboratory. Normally he would be one floor up in the shared space with Dr. Hermann Gottlieb. In fact, Mako looked around carefully, this wasn’t even truly a lab. What was he doing down here? Suddenly, she felt angry. This was supposed to be her hideout, her escape from the world and now here was this interloper ruining everything. She frowned and opened her mouth to say something, to tell him that he had no right to be here and to ask if he even had permission to house laboratory equipment and conduct experiments in this room.

She took in a breath and then stopped. Mako felt her heart beat faster in her ears, blood pounding as the muscle accelerated. Nervous electricity shot through her body and a cold sweat formed over her skin. The thought of speaking to another human caused her to feel dizzy, like someone was pinching at the bridge of her nose with a white-hot poker. Her stomach rolled. Mako had to get away.

Slowly, quietly, she opened the door and slipped back out, leaving it ajar, the way she had found it. She stooped, hands on her knees, head bent, breathless in the corridor, gulping at the air and trying to reclaim control over her body. Footsteps sounded from down the hall, raising her heart rate once more. Mako stood and wiped her mouth. Another person? Here? She was dizzy again and her panic was rapidly spiraling to a climax. She didn’t wait around to find out what would happen when it peaked. Avoiding being seen by whoever it was approaching from down the hall, Mako slid back through the door into the lab that contained the busy Dr. Geiszler. He didn’t notice her reappearance and Mako took the opportunity to press herself into a dark corner of the room, the far one near the door.

Eventually her heart slowed to a normal rate and the sweat dried upon her skin. Mako licked her lips and curled her hair back behind her ears, straightening her posture and rolling her shoulders to ease the tension held between her blades. Near her, off to one side, was an empty chair. Mako made her way over to sit in it, stopping only once when she thought Dr. Geiszler was going to turn around. Instead he moved to the far end of the table filled with equipment and Mako eased her weight into the chair, relieved.

As Mako settled into the seat, an odd feeling came over her. Not one person in the shatterdome knew where she was. Not even Raleigh. For all intents and purposes, she had disappeared from reality and was totally alone. Dr. Geiszler hadn’t noticed her come in and out of the room leading Mako to wonder for a moment if she had actually become invisible. She smiled to herself. Now, that would be a useful skill. Mako raised her hands in the air and waved them at the scientist’s’ turned back. Dr. Geiszler continued to work without any knowledge of what was going on behind him and Mako had to stifle a giggle of elation. He didn’t even suspect that someone else was in the room with him. Mako was completely anonymous and the thought calmed her immensely. She felt safe here, alone in a little bubble of her own, but not lonely. Heaving a great, silent sigh, Mako leaned back comfortably into the chair and turned her attention to the man at the far end of the room.

Dr. Geiszler was a peculiar person, one whom Mako didn’t particularly like either. Upon meeting him for the first time, Mako had felt an odd sense of pity directed at the man. She wondered why anyone would ever feel such awe for the Kaiju without first recognizing the scope of devastation they had caused on the human world. Dr. Geiszler’s blatant love for the alien monsters was unrealistic and, frankly, more than a little insulting. Why was he like that?

Mako stared hard at his back, as if her steady gaze would reveal to her the secrets of his psyche. Her eyes fell upon his tattoos, clearly visible with the short sleeves of his shirt. Anger rushed through her body. Who was he to idolise the creatures? What gave him the right to immortalize the horror of the monsters upon his flesh, reminding all who saw the designs of the devastation and the death that followed in their wake? His voice interrupted her thoughts.

“This is wrong!” he yelled out. “Fucking wrong!” Without warning, the scientist snatched a random beaker from the table in front of him and threw it as hard as he could against far wall of the room, opposite from where Mako was sitting. The glass shattered easily against the concrete, the loud splintering noise matched by the sizzling foaming sound of whatever chemical had been contained within the beaker reacting against the material of the wall. “It can’t be wrong!” Dr. Geiszler yelled at the fizzing chemicals. “I can’t be wrong!” His voice was screeching in his throat, cracking with emotion.

Mako held herself stiffly, shocked at his sudden strange behavior. She watched as the muscles in his back, visible through his shirt, slowly relaxed one by one. “I can’t be,” he repeated. “I just can’t.” He stared at the wall for a long time, eventually putting his hands on his hips and appearing to calm down entirely. He turned his head a bit and spoke into the tape recorder still balanced on the side of the aquarium. “This is most upsetting as I clearly predicted the exact opposite of this outcome.” Mako started when she realized there were tears running down his cheeks. He wasn’t crying outright and the inflection of his voice hadn’t changed from his usual upbeat cadence, but there was no mistaking it: Dr. Geiszler was weeping. “I’ll have to start again.”

Mako didn’t belong here. Even if he didn’t know she was in the room with him, Mako knew this was a private moment and she was intruding. She got up from the chair and walked over to the door, feeling very strange and voyeuristic and now, lonely: The curse of the invisible man. She hid in her room for the rest of the day, tinkering with the many gear sets that covered her desk and tried to keep her mind off of Dr. Geiszler and his tears of frustration.

That night in her bed, while she listened to Raleigh snore on the ground of her room, Mako couldn’t get the image of the lab out of her mind. She wished it was a puzzle that she could physically touch, something that made sense and that she could figure out like the electrical systems on her desk. Raleigh let out an odd sort of sigh and she turned her head to look at his sleeping form. His snoring resumed it’s rhythm and Mako smiled. While he spent most of his time in his own room during the day, Raleigh had moved his mattress onto Mako’s floor so he could sleep near her.

The first night they had left the medical bay had been a disaster. They both had nightmares and finally Mako had gotten up and walked across the hall to knock on Raleigh’s door that was already opening before she got her fist on the metal. “I can’t sleep,” he had said.

“I know,” she had replied. “Move your mattress into my room.” From then on, Raleigh had slept on the floor next to Mako and the nightmares had stopped.

Looking at him now, in the dim light of her night lamp, Mako smiled softly. She loved that man, down to the very essence of her being, she loved him and she knew he loved her back, but they weren’t in love. Perhaps they might have been if they hadn’t Drifted, if they hadn’t saved the world together. Instead, what transpired between them was something deeper and better suited to whom they both were.

Now, watching Raleigh’s chest gently rise and fall in sleep, Mako was set at ease, the jumble of her mind soothed into processing the mystery of the scientist and the lab in the sub-levels while she dreamed. She would go back tomorrow, she vowed sleepily, her eyes closing. She would go back and figure out what he was doing in the depths of the shatterdome.

The next day after a hurried breakfast, and an even more hurried excuse to Raleigh, Mako made her way down to the lab. She was careful to wind her way there casually, walking in a roundabout fashion to her destination, lest anyone suspect where she was going. Of course, everyone was much too busy to notice, but as one half of the surviving team that saved the world, Mako never knew how much was “too careful”. She reached the door within fifteen minutes. It was ajar, just as it had been the day before, and Mako stole into the room as easily as she had done yesterday.

The same light was on in the back of the room, illuminating the table of aquariums, but today there was another light as well. To Mako’s left, stretching the entire length of one wall, was a long table filled with beakers and glassware and larger pieces of equipment she assumed was for measuring the different outputs of certain bio matters. The conductor of this symphony of scientific paraphernalia stood in the middle of the table with his back to the door. Dr. Geiszler was wearing the same clothes Mako had seen him in the day before and she wondered if he had slept at all. He was muttering to himself as he examined a piece of paper currently being fed out from a large box that was humming electronically while it printed.

Mako stood very still, hovering just inside the threshold of the lab, as so he wouldn’t notice her. She had a feeling that Dr. Geiszler was so engrossed in his work he wouldn’t look up for anything short of an explosion, let alone one person quietly watching him from the door. “It’s nothing but the same stupid result,” the scientist was saying as the paper finished printing from the box. He ripped the sheet out from the feeder. “Every single time. That can’t be right. Note: Hermann is wrong. Not me.” He had spoken the last in the direction of his chest where the tape recorder was hanging: it had been jury-rigged into a necklace.

Mako turned to find her chair from yesterday was still in the corner near the door and she quietly moved to sit in it. Mako ignored the scientist puttering away across the room. Instead, Mako let her head fall back to rest on the wall behind her. She stared up at the ceiling letting her mind go blank, revelling in the unique privacy being in this lab gave her. The feeling of anonymity increased as she remained seated, slipping into almost a meditative state as Mako focused only on her breathing and her internal thoughts. Soon, she wasn’t Mako, she wasn’t a Ranger, an ex-Jaeger pilot, a hero. She wasn’t anybody, she just simply was.

Some hours later, Mako roused herself from this state, wiping at her eyes sleepily. In truth she had been napping, which she realized only after the sound of Dr. Geiszler dropping something on accident startled her from her doze. Mako stood and left the room, stretching only when she was safely out in the corridor. She raised her arms up over her head to ease the tension in her muscles and she smiled. It was cathartic to be in this room, this lab. Dropping out of her identity even for just a few hours was, ironically, making her feel like her whole self again.

In the days that followed, Mako returned to the lab often, taking refuge in the darkened room, lulled by the constant stream of Dr. Geiszler’s mutterings and by her lack of responsibility. In the lab she didn’t have to be anyone she didn’t want. She didn’t have to be the hero and no one demanded anything of her. She even developed amiable feelings toward the scientist, taking some time to study him in between her naps or meditations. Mako felt that she knew him a bit better now, knew what made him tick, although the mystery of his tattoos and tears were still out of her understanding.

Mako began to spend more and more time down in the sub-levels, even beginning to take stacks of mail down with her, quietly opening the envelopes and reading the post addressed to her sitting in the chair in the back. She worked while he worked, with Dr. Geiszler suspecting not a thing. The mail consisted mostly of letters of thanks, statements of adoration and awe, even proclamations of being in her debt, her: the savior of the human race. Mako opened and read each one, keeping the drawings from children in one pile on the ground before her feet, and everything else in another. She said nothing as she worked, felt nothing, it was just a task that needed to get done.

Somewhere deep in her mind, Mako clung desperately to the wildly inaccurate belief that when all the mail was opened her life would begin again. All by completing this simple task she would be propelled forward, her timeline ignited to start again, moving her forward. She would never voice this thought process and she never would, so buried as it was in the recesses of her subconscious, but there she sat, refusing to stop until it was over. When she did finish, when all her mail was open, Mako looked up, distressed. Nothing had changed, nothing was different, she still was the same person, the woman who saved the world, who no longer piloted a Jaeger, and who was an orphan. Her breathing intensified as her thoughts came faster and faster in a flurry of fear and panic.

“Well that’s not good,” Dr. Geiszler’s voice came from the other side of the room, dragging Mako’s thoughts up from their despairing decent. She blinked a few times, bringing him back into focus. He was bent over the aquarium with sand in it and was speaking distractedly. “I’ll have to check the other levels.” Dr. Geiszler moved to walk away from the tank toward the long table with the chemical filled beakers when Mako saw what was about to happen. The strap of his jury-rigged tape recorder necklace was still attached to one edge of the aquarium and would drag it off the table if he kept walking, which, of course, he did.

Mako moved without thinking. She leapt from her chair and sprinted to the back of the room, bending to catch the aquarium before it hit the ground and broke. She tumbled to the floor clutching at the tank, the weight of the thing too much for her to have caught and still remain upright. Landing on her back, her breath was knocked out of her lungs and she lay there gasping as she held the tank aloft slightly, protecting the contents from shifting as best she could. Her eyes flicked to the side as she saw Dr. Geiszler looking down at her.

“Miss Mori?” His voice was full of confusion. “What are you…where did you come from?” He looked around the room frowning, as if some clue to her sudden appearance would become evident to him from a cursory glance.

Mako tried to give a little bow of her head from her position on the ground and failed. “I’m sorry, Dr. Geiszler, I was in the corner…um…working.” She coughed, her breath slowly coming back under her control.

He frowned. “You’ve been here this whole time?” Mako nodded. “I didn’t even notice.” He looked down at her again and suddenly his eyes widened. “Oh! Let me help you up!” Dr. Geiszler extended a hand and Mako offered the tank instead. The scientist blinked once before taking the aquarium and putting back on the table. When he turned around, Mako had gotten to her feet and was dusting off the seat of her pants. She quickly bowed when she saw him looking at her.

“I apologize Dr. Geiszler, for interrupting your work,” she remained in the bow for a moment longer than necessary, wanting to avoid eye contact. When she finally straightened, she kept her gaze lowered. “I came here seeking the quiet…” Mako wrinkled her nose. That sound wrong, she wasn’t explaining herself correctly. “I needed to get away from it all,” she said, lamely waving a hand to the ceiling, indicating the main levels of the shatterdome. To her surprise, he nodded.

“Say no more, Miss Mori, I understand completely.”

Mako’s eyebrows rose. “You do?”

He nodded again. “Yeah, that’s why I came down here in the first place. To ‘get away from it all’, so to speak.” He shrugged. “It may not make sense but I think it’s the Drift. Scientifically, we haven’t yet had time to study any long-term residual effects on the human brain so the possibilities are endless. I’ve actually been keeping a notebook of all my symptoms…” he trailed off as he moved as if to find the notebook to show to her but Mako cut him off.

“Can I stay with you?” she blurted. Dr. Geiszler jerked back to face Mako, his surprise showing plainly on his face.

“You can stay, if you want, but I can’t imagine that it would be very exciting for you.”

Mako shook her head. “I don’t need excitement right now, Dr. Geiszler. I need boring, everyday…I need easy.”

“Well I can promise you boredom. Oh and please call me Newt,” he said, smiling at her. “Only my mother calls me doctor.” To this, Mako bowed slightly again. When she stood, they looked at each other uncomfortably.

“I can’t stay today,” Mako said quickly.

“Of course, yes, whatever you like.” His words came out in a rush.

They stared at each other awkwardly for a few moments more before Mako gave another bow and turned to leave the room. “Bye,” he called out after her in a voice that sounded like he still didn’t know what had just happened.

Outside the door, Mako pressed herself into a secluded alcove and let out a sigh. Her heart was beating fast, but it wasn’t rattling around her chest at break-neck speeds. She had spoken to someone other than Raleigh, or Herc and Tendo, and lived. Giddiness erupted in her stomach. She wanted to run and tell Raleigh, let him know what she had just accomplished, but something held her back. Mako felt that somehow Raleigh wouldn’t be impressed with whom she had been talking. Suddenly, Mako felt her panic rise within her and she turned and opened the door to the lab. Newt looked up at the noise, confused. “Actually, can I stay now?” Mako asked.

“S-sure,” Newt stuttered. “Come on, back, in.” Mako smiled sheepishly at his little joke and moved to sit in her chair. “Is that where you’ve been sitting?” he asked her. Mako nodded. “I can’t believe I have never noticed you. Not once!” Newt began muttering to himself as he turned back to his aquariums. Mako was taken aback when she realized he wasn’t going to pay her any more mind. This was perfect. They would go on as before and nothing would have to be awkward. Well, Mako thought. Any more awkward than what had just happened.

As Newt kept working, Mako studied him again, this time with a new perspective. He didn’t pretend to be someone else around her and, more importantly, he didn’t expect her to be someone else, didn’t expect her to live up to any ridiculous hero ideals. If Mako had felt safe before, sitting in the silence of the chair, she felt especially safe now. Safe, and validated.

“Now Miss Mori,” Newt said from his spot across the room. His back was still turned to her as he focused on what he was doing, but Mako could hear him clearly. “I normally lock up around dinner because, you know, I have to eat. Just so you know in case I lock you in the lab. But if I did, I open back up at midnight so you wouldn’t be alone for long.” He chuckled at his own humor. Mako smiled from her spot on the chair.

“That’s okay,” she quipped. “I love being locked up in strange labs.” Newt snorted at this but kept on working. The silence that stretched between them for the next few hours was comfortable. Mako leisurely organized the letters at her feet, pushing most into a “recycle” pile and slowly perusing the stack of children’s drawings. She smiled when she looked at one that had Raleigh depicted in an especially bulky sweater. She looked up when she hear Newt cough.

“Also, I sometimes get frustrated and I can’t control myself. I just don’t want you to be startled.” He spoke with his head down, his words mumbled, like he was embarrassed and it was taking some great strength for him to admit this to her. “So, I’m sorry in advance, Miss Mori.”

Mako stared at Newt’s back wondering again at how this man’s mind worked. She got up from her seat and crossed the room, coming to stand next to him and putting a gentle hand on his back. “You can call me Mako,” she said, smiling when he turned and looked at her.

“That’s such a pretty name,” he said, not really knowing what else to say.

“Thank you,” Mako said. Then, on a whim, she leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. “And thank you for letting me stay.” Without looking back, Mako turned and left the lab, too embarrassed to stay in the same room of the man she had just kissed. Newt watched her go, his face a steady blush of pink long after the door closed and her footsteps had receded down the hall.


End file.
